


may angels watch me through the night

by starkly



Series: you've been thunderstruck [26]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Monster Hunters, M/M, Tony Stark Has Nightmares, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:20:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28306671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starkly/pseuds/starkly
Summary: When you’ve been raised in a certain line of work, it’s tough seeing past the lies you’ve been fed your whole life, but Tony knows that’s no excuse. Maybe some of those monsters had it coming, and plenty more of them didn’t, but the one thing he knows for certain is that he’ll always be a murderer.So he’s certain that when he wakes in the middle of the night from nightmares he most assuredly earned himself, he doesn’t deserve the man who holds him in his arms and strokes his hair until the terror subsides.
Relationships: Tony Stark/Thor
Series: you've been thunderstruck [26]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2064666
Comments: 1
Kudos: 41





	may angels watch me through the night

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for NaNoWriMo 2020 and [posted here](https://aleator.tumblr.com/post/636554978219196416) on my tumblr writing blog. This fic was proofread before being uploaded here but is otherwise unchanged.
> 
> Prompts taken from the AU-gust 2020 challenge list on Twitter. Day Twenty-Six: Monster Hunter AU.

It’s hard to get over the guilt of what he’s done sometimes. When you’ve been raised in a certain line of work, it’s tough seeing past the lies you’ve been fed your whole life, but Tony knows that’s no excuse. Maybe some of those monsters had it coming, and plenty more of them didn’t, but the one thing he knows for certain is that he’ll always be a murderer.

So he’s certain that when he wakes in the middle of the night from nightmares he most assuredly earned himself, he doesn’t deserve the man who holds him in his arms and strokes his hair until the terror subsides.

Thor is perfect in all ways, except for his stubbornness and his temper and how he sheds on the furniture sometimes. So maybe he’s not completely perfect, but Tony couldn’t ask for a better partner. He’s kind, and caring, and loyal to a fault. Which is why Tony’s most recurring nightmare is about how he almost once killed Thor.

He wakes with a shout in the dark, sweat sticking his hair to his forehead. In seconds there’s a pair of strong arms wrapped around him, holding him to Thor’s chest. He can hear Thor’s heartbeat and feel the steady rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, and slowly he begins to calm down, his own jackrabbiting heartbeat steadying to match Thor’s.

“Okay?” Thor murmurs, pushing Tony’s hair back from his forehead and pressing a kiss to his temple.

Tony shakes his head.

“The forest again?”

Tony doesn’t respond. They both remember the forest that night. Three members of Thor’s pack had already been eliminated by another hunter who was closing in on Thor and his wounded mate. By the time Tony got there, the hunter was already dead, and so was Thor’s mate.

Even injured, Thor was a beast, over eight feet tall standing on his hind legs in his half-shifted form. The hunter’s blood was on his snout and his claws, but so was his mate’s, one final, desperate bid to save her from bleeding out.

Tony should have taken out Thor for killing that hunter. It would have been easy. Thor was bleeding from a silver bullet wound that wouldn’t heal unless the silver was properly cleaned out. All Tony had to do was end his suffering with a clean death. Instead he’d dropped his gun and patched Thor’s wound the best he could, staying with him in that forest until the sun rose and Thor could shift back.

He’d taken Thor home then, and Thor had never left. Tony supposes there was no point in leaving then; his whole pack was dead. Tony was all he had.

In the present, Thor rubs a hand over Tony’s back and Tony lifts his head to meet his gaze at last.

“I’m fine,” he says, voice rough from sleep.

“You saved me,” Thor reminds him quietly. “I would have killed you if I’d been strong enough, but you helped me. You went against everything you knew for me.”

Tony sighs and rests his head in the crook of Thor’s shoulder, taking a deep breath in. Contrary to popular belief, werewolves don’t smell like wet dog all the time. Right now Thor smells like the coconut shampoo he always uses, and the familiar scent calms Tony down.

“Are you sniffing me?” Thor asks, amusement lacing his voice.

“No,” Tony mutters, muffled by his face pressed up against Thor’s neck.

Thor laughs and pulls Tony closer, nuzzling at his neck in return and playfully sniffing at him. The scratch of Thor’s beard against his skin pulls a laugh out of him at last, and Thor smiles at this accomplishment.

“You’ve got to wonder who the real werewolf is here,” Thor teases, carding his fingers back through Tony’s hair and then scratching him behind the ears, a move that makes Tony sag bonelessly in his arms.

“I guess you’re rubbing off on me.”

Thor grins, showing teeth. “Not nearly enough, I think.”

That gets another laugh out of Tony, and he nudges Thor’s shoulder with his own. “Letch.”

“Later, perhaps,” Thor says, pressing another kiss to Tony’s forehead. He lays them both back down, his arms still around Tony as he pulls him in close to rest against him. “Try to go back to sleep, my love. I will keep the nightmares at bay.”

Snuggled up close to Thor, Tony does his best to forget about what could have been and focus on the now. Thor is healthy and alive, a warm presence in his arms, and as Thor strokes his hair and gently rubs a hand between his shoulders, Tony drifts back into a calm and dreamless sleep that lasts the rest of the night.


End file.
